The invention concerns a coupling for connecting two conduits of a vacuum conveying device to each other, with a coupling piece provided on the first conduit and with a counter coupling piece which is insertable into the coupling piece and provided on the second flexibly configured conduit. The invention further relates to a vacuum conveying device with such couplings.
Such vacuum conveying devices have, for example, storage containers in which bulk material is stored. Each storage container can be connected by conduits to receivers, for example, to processing machines for the bulk material. In order to be able to connect any storage container with any receiver, coupling stations are employed to which the conduits coming from the storage containers are fixedly connected. By means of couplings, these conduits are connected to vacuum conduits extending to the respective receivers. The vacuum conduits that are extending to the receivers are flexible hoses which, in practice, are generally contorted or twisted or also entangled with other hoses within the vacuum conveying device. Upon insertion of the counter coupling piece of the flexible hose into the coupling piece within the coupling station, this causes a strong restoring force that makes coupling difficult.
In order to ensure proper coupling between two conduits, it is known to provide a sensor on the coupling piece, in particular an RFID sensor, and a corresponding transponder on the flexible conduit. For the coupling process, it is required that the transponder is precisely positioned opposite the sensor. Due to the restoring force, it is often difficult in practice to connect the flexible conduits in such a way to the supply conduits that the transponder is precisely aligned so as to be opposite the sensor.
The invention has therefore the object to design the coupling of the aforementioned kind and the vacuum conveying device such that the conduits can be plugged together in a simple way.